Xiaoxu (小畜): the clouds gather, has it rained?

Wind over heaven: one yin line among five yang

The lower trigram of Xiaoxu (小畜) is Qian (乾, heaven) and the upper trigram is Xun (巽, wind), so it is read as Qian below, Xun above. Of its six lines only the fourth is a broken yin line; the other five are yang, so the whole figure has a single yin line, in the fourth place. In the Shuo Gua, Qian gets the word "strength" and Xun the word "entering".

Open the full-size diagram

Xiaoxu and its inverse hexagram Yu: a figure with its yin in place four and a figure with its yang in place four are each other's inverse.

The Judgment: clouds gathered, rain not yet fallen

The Judgment of Xiaoxu is short: "Success. Dense clouds, no rain, from our western outskirts." It gives one word of success and then paints the sky: the clouds are thick, no rain falls, and the clouds come from the western outskirts of "us". The Commentary on the Judgments replies to each of the three in turn:

The Commentary on the Judgments first explains "success": Qian is strong, Xun enters, and the yang lines in the middle let the will be carried out, so there is success. "It is still moving forward" means the clouds are still going on, and "the bestowing has not yet gone out" means the rain has not yet been given. The same word, "bestowing", appears in the Commentary on the Judgments on Qian, "clouds move and rain is bestowed": the clouds move and then the rain comes down. In Xiaoxu the clouds are already thick and the rain is not yet bestowed. It is the same sky, caught half way.

The Great Image: wind moves over heaven, and a noble person refines the virtue of culture

The Great Image (大象) of Xiaoxu reads: wind moves over heaven, Xiaoxu; the noble person uses it to refine the virtue of culture. The first half is the figure: wind (Xun) above heaven (Qian). The second half is the conduct: "refine the virtue of culture", where refine means to make fine and the virtue of culture means the virtue of civil learning.

Set it beside the Great Image of Qian. Qian over Qian is "heaven moves with strength", and what moves is heaven itself. Xiaoxu changes the upper trigram to wind, so what moves is the wind above heaven. The conduct shrinks with it: for Qian it is strengthening the self without rest, and for Xiaoxu the noble person does one thing, making the virtue of culture finer.

Six lines: return, sincerity, rain

Three words come back through the six statements: "return" in lines 1 and 2, "sincerity" in lines 4 and 5, and "rain" in the top line. The Judgment's "no rain" has become "it has rained" by the end.

First nine, "returns by his own way", comes back along his own road, and "how could that be a fault" asks what blame there could be. Nine in the second place, "led back", is drawn back, and the Small Image (小象) says "nor does he lose himself". Both yang lines wanted to go up, both turned back first, and both statements end on "good fortune".

Nine in the third place is different: "the carriage loses its spokes; husband and wife turn their eyes away from each other". The Small Image comments "he cannot put the household right". It is the only one of the three lower lines without "good fortune".

Six in the fourth place is the one yin line: "sincere; blood departs, alarm goes out: no blame". Pain leaves and fear goes out. The Small Image adds "it joins the will above". Nine in the fifth place: "sincerity that binds; rich together with one's neighbors". Sincerity ties people together and wealth is shared with the neighbors; the Small Image says "he is not rich alone".

The neighbors of Xiaoxu: Yu, Lü and Kui

The inverse hexagram of Xiaoxu is Yu, where each line is its opposite: the lone yin among five yang turns into a lone yang among five yin, still in place four. Turn Xiaoxu over and you get its reversed hexagram, Lü (履), with the yin line now in place three. Take lines two to five, split them again into a lower and an upper trigram, and the result is its nuclear hexagram, Kui (睽).

Where there is gathering there must be accumulation, so it was followed by Xiaoxu.

Xiaoxu follows Bi, and after it comes Lü, since the Xu Gua says ritual comes after things are gathered. The Za Gua gives Xiaoxu a single word: "few". Look at the figure once more: one yin line, five yang lines, and the few are the yin.